Empathy, memory, and aging during the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

Recently, there has been increasing attention to the interaction between empathy and memory. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a period when empathy played a key role in people's behaviors, we assessed the relationship between empathy and memory. In this pre-registered report, we used memory accuracy for the number of COVID-19 cases as a measure of recent memory and examined its relationship with trait empathy. Moreover, we investigated whether cognitive vs. affective empathy differently associate with one's memory for the number of COVID-19 cases, given evidence for distinct mechanisms for the two aspects of empathy. Finally, we assessed how age is related to empathy-memory associations. To address these questions, we used the Boston College COVID-19 Dataset, which included surveys assessing dispositional empathy and memory for the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases during the first wave of the pandemic. Empathy was not associated with memory accuracy for the confirmed cases when using an empathy measure that combined both cognitive and affective empathy. However, when using a measure that separately assessed cognitive and affective empathy, only affective empathy, specifically the personal distress subscale, was associated with greater memory accuracy. There was no age-related difference in memory accuracy despite age-related decreases in affective empathy. Results suggest that individuals with greater affective empathy (i.e., greater tendency to feel discomfort by the suffering of others) can have more accurate memory for details of an ongoing empathy-evoking situation. Findings are discussed in the context of motivation and emotional arousal. The current study provides ecological evidence to corroborate the interplay of empathy and memory.

Keywords: Age; COVID-19; Empathy; Memory; Personal distress.

Graphical abstract

Fig. 1

Brief information of the study timeline.

Fig. 2

Scatterplots depicting the relations between (a) affective empathy and averaged memory accuracy (r(247) = −0.14, p = .029), (b) affective empathy and averaged memory bias (r(247) = −0.11, p = .075), (c) personal distress subscale and averaged memory accuracy (r(247) = −0.14, p = .027), and (d) personal distress subscale and averaged memory bias (r(247) = −0.17, p = .009). The plots reflect Pearson correlations (not correcting for control variables). For memory accuracy, the value of 0 indicates perfect estimate of confirmed cases and higher values than 0 reflect the absolute value of the deviation from the response.

Fig. 3

Scatterplots depicting the relations between (a) age and cognitive empathy (r(247) = −0.18, p = .004) and (b) age and affective empathy (r(247) = −0.15, p = .017). The plots reflect Pearson correlations (not correcting for control variables).